Chapter 122: Swordsman Online 3 BL (Extra IV)

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Chapter 122: Swordsman Online 3 BL (Extra IV)

Wang Yumo Extra:

Habit was the most terrifying thing, whether one mistook habit for love or love for habit. In the end, all that remained was regret.

A love understood only after losing someone left not even the chance to reminisce. She was willing to spend her entire life repaying that debt.

All around her were nothing but cold white walls. Everything in the room, from the walls to the tables and chairs, was made of a soft, water-like material, comfortable yet luxurious. Even the bathroom contained nothing hard. The walls were soft enough to lean against and sleep on, truly eliminating any possibility of a sharp object appearing. Aside from the people who delivered her food, she could not see any other living being. Her once-healthy skin had gradually grown pale, and she was too lazy to take care of her disheveled long hair. Where was the beauty that had once made people’s hearts flutter? She would not even need makeup to play a ghost in a horror story.

Her fingers slowly reached toward the skylight, the only place in the room where she could feel the sunlight. That bright beam of light reminded her of that person’s smile, brilliant as the sun. Yet just like the light shining down, it was warm without burning anyone, making people grow accustomed to it without realizing it until they took that warmth for granted.

Even though she was standing beneath the midsummer sun, her body felt colder than ever. Her fingertips trembled, while the thick cotton clothes she wore out of season looked so strange. The warm sunlight shining down could not warm her body, which was like ice. The cold rising from the depths of her heart gradually spread throughout her entire body. Her fingers pressed against the bedding, unconsciously increasing the force, but just before she tore it, she withdrew her palm. She would not, and could not, destroy anything here again. She had already taken away the most important person in this sanatorium. How could she be so selfish as to take anything more?

After wandering through the world of the living for three long years, she had finally returned here, once again as a patient. Only this time, there was no director left to tolerate her, and no one left to stop her when she went mad. This time, she had simply lost her freedom, confined within this space where all she could see were four walls. Lying on the bed beneath a thick quilt, she could not feel the slightest warmth. She gazed at that beam of light from afar, clearly within reach yet as distant as the ends of the earth.

She narrowed her eyes slightly, unable to stop recalling the warmth that had splashed onto her fingertips and cheek at that moment. It was the color that person had loved most, a brilliant red as vivid as the most beautiful rose in bloom, yet it had been the accompaniment to a funeral song. Although the ending had not been what she wanted, if Yang Qifeng had not appeared in that room, the outcome would not have changed. She still would have used the blade she knew best to kill the person she loved most.

Yes… The person she loved most. Let alone asking anyone else to believe it, even she herself found it utterly absurd. How pathetic. She had gone to such lengths to approach him, searching for his weaknesses by every means possible. Then, after he drew his final breath, she had hypocritically thrown herself over his body, crying and confessing her love. What a ridiculous farce. Yet she had been the one who directed it, and she had been the one who played the lead…

It was only when that person drew his final breath that the emptiness in her heart, devoid of all sensation, finally made her understand. Without realizing it, she had already poured all her love into him. It was completely different from what she had felt for Yang Qijing, so intense that it made even her soul tremble. In an instant, she had lost all thought, and her body had grown cold from that loss.

Perhaps it was only because she had owed him a debt that she had grown accustomed to valuing him above herself, and therefore mistaken that habit for a lifelong love. So when true love appeared, she only thought it was the warmth of a closeness she had never experienced before. A killer needed nothing beyond a reason to survive. There was no need to linger anywhere else, and warmth was nothing more than a momentary attachment.

So time and again, she believed that even if she severed that connection, she would feel neither regret nor longing. Yet she never knew that the attachment she thought she could abandon had long since seeped into her very bones, making her body more honest than her heart. The satisfaction she had felt every time she drew close to his body now clearly surfaced in her heart. Her own foolishness had destroyed every trace of that intoxication.

Wang Yumo spread open her palm. Every line upon it was clearly visible, and her fingers bore not the slightest callus, concealing the training she had once endured. She was a killer, a killer who lived for only one person. From the moment she had stepped onto this path of no return, she had known that she belonged to that child. It was because of him that she had gained the will to persevere and the courage to keep living.

If Yang Qijing was the light, then she was the shadow that depended on that light to survive. Where there was light, there would inevitably be shadow, and where there was shadow, there would also inevitably be light. Thus, they were destined to remain entangled for a lifetime. From the moment Jing had taken her out of the orphanage and had her stay by his side, she had no longer belonged to herself.

The things she had done for him were too numerous to count. His smiles and sweet words were her greatest encouragement. It was as though her life existed because of him, and could continue because of him. She had never cared about other people’s opinions. Her world had always contained only him. From one mission to the next, each was merely a brief separation. Once a mission ended, she would return to where she had started, where someone waited for her right where she had left him.

Jing had once said that the person he could least afford to lose was her. It was the sweetest thing she had ever heard. For those words, whether it was a mountain of blades or a sea of flames, even if her fair palms were stained with blood that could never be washed clean, she would have no regrets and no fear.

To her, approaching Miao Lichen and then killing him had been nothing more than an ordinary mission. Even though this man possessed the most breathtakingly beautiful face she had ever seen, even though his smile made warmth rise within the heart that had only ever been moved by one person.

Even though she could not help becoming addicted to every moment their skin touched, she could still swing her blade without hesitation and sever the thread between them that had already been so fragile. She simply had not expected that what she severed this time was not merely their shallow bond, but a wound through her entire world, causing her life to reach its end ahead of time.

During the three years after losing Miao Lichen, she did not know how she had survived one day after another. Watching Yang Qijing gradually fall in love with the man who had once given all his love to Miao Lichen, she had already sensed the taste of a conspiracy. But there was no need to stop it. Because she had long wanted to personally bring things to an end for the person before her, yet she did not want to disturb the time her beloved was spending on the road to the afterlife.

Besides… sometimes living was more painful than death. After death, there would be no more thoughts and no more longing. Only obtaining something one believed was finally theirs, then losing it, could truly chill the heart.

Rong Hansheng and Yang Qijing had fallen deeply in love? Even if she had only her limbs left, she would never believe such a rumor. How could someone who loved that person fall in love with someone else in such a short time? In this world, who could replicate that warmth a hundred percent?

The more glorious things appeared on the surface, the greater the conspiracy hidden beneath them was likely to be. Perhaps Yang Qijing was actually living a life worse than death, while there were still people who did not know the truth and envied his happiness.

‘Don’t you think so, A’chen?’

This was the first and last time she had looked at his tombstone, and three years had already passed. She had finally gathered the courage to witness her own sin. After living like a walking corpse for so long, she had finally begun to understand what it meant to breathe, what it meant to be rational, and… what it meant to regret and miss someone.

Her fingers trembled as they touched the exquisite tombstone, yet she felt not the slightest trace of coldness. Her body was probably just as cold as the tombstone. Her warmth had been taken away on that day long ago. The only memory she had of warmth was the temperature of the blood that had splashed onto her face and fingers.

She did not clearly remember what happened afterward. She only knew that she had stumbled into this sanatorium, and that the doctors’ hatred toward her was accompanied by carefully concealed fear. She had wanted so badly to approach that office building she had entered countless times, wanted so badly to enter that room she had visited countless times. Perhaps everything was merely a terrible nightmare, and that person was still sitting in the familiar chair, correcting documents.

A smile unconsciously curled at the corners of her lips, yet blood began to flow from her mouth, staining the exquisite white cotton clothes she wore. See? Even her body refused to let her deceive herself. Killing the person she loved most meant repaying the debt with that same blood. Her fingers rested against the bloodstain, and at that moment, her eyes surely held longing. Because that was the color he loved most. From the moment he died, she had decided that she, too, would love this color. Not the filthy color of blood, but the most brilliant red.

Afterward, she once again lived here as a patient. It was said that Yang Qijing feared she would disturb his life with Rong Hansheng. How could she not understand? Rong Hansheng would never allow her to touch anything related to that person again. Not even a corner of his tombstone, not even a distant glimpse. Yet this was also what she had hoped for. When she came here, she had already prepared her own ending. Rong Hansheng’s actions had merely helped push it along.

Wang Yumo opened her eyes. How long had she been here? She had long since forgotten the passage of time. Every day, there seemed to be nothing left to do except remember. She remembered the warmth from when she could still feel touch. She remembered every fragment concerning that person, even the moment of his death. Because at least until the moment she truly died, she could not forget the slightest detail about him.

Her life from then on would probably remain unchanged. Aside from remembering him, there would only be remembering him…

Only, the so-called future was far too short, so short that less than a month had passed. The moment she lost her breath, the only thing she could still see was these four snow-white walls. She did not see the phantom she had awaited for who knew how long. Tears unconsciously slipped from her lifeless eyes. Who had said that before dying, one would surely be able to “see” the person they loved? Sure enough, no matter how much time had passed, that person would never forgive her foolishness.

The hand tightly gripping the red cotton garment gradually lost its strength and fell limp at her side. If the garment were opened, even the cotton stuffing inside would be vivid red. In this room, where even her meals were delivered directly through the skylight and no one ever entered, the thick scent of blood remained sealed away.

Three years ago, when she had lost her sense of temperature, the doctor had already told her that her life had begun to fade away. If a person lost the will to live, their body could not hold on for long.

Using the final flicker of life, she returned to where everything had begun. She stubbornly turned the beginning into the end.

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